1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a propellant holder for an explosion driven setting tool and having a housing with an inner space for receiving the propellant, and to an explosion-driven setting tool including a setting mechanism driven by a propellant, an ignition unit for igniting the propellant, and a receptacle for receiving a propellant holder.
2. Description of the Prior Art
The propellant holder of the type described above can be filled with a powder fuel in form of cartridges or pellets but can also be filled with a fluid or gaseous fuel, with the powder, fluid or gaseous fuel forming the propellant for driving a setting mechanism in a setting tool.
With contemporary setting tools driven with a solid fuel, the cartridges or pellets are carried by a magazine strip which serves as a propellant holder and in which a plurality of pellet charges in blisters or cartridges are arranged. The magazine strips can, thus, be formed as blister or cartridge strips, respectively.
A propellant holder in form of a magazine strip is disclosed, e.g., in U.S. Pat. No. 5,811,717, with ten propellant charges being arranged on the strip. At the height of the penultimate propellant charge, there is provided an indicator mark on the strip. The indicator mark, when it becomes visible in the setting tool, indicates to the user that only one propellant charge remains on the magazine strip. No other information about the propellant charge is available to the user.
In order to insure that a large number of setting processes can be performed with a setting tool without replacement of cartridge, blister, or magazine strips necessary for the setting processes, there is proposed to use magazine strips having an increased length.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,204,473, of which the present invention is an improvement, discloses an explosion-driven setting tool and a cartridge strip therefor having a large number of propellant charges arranged in a box-shaped magazine. The cartridge or magazine strips are arranged in the box in a predetermined position.
The drawbacks of this box-shaped magazine of U.S. Pat. No. 4,204,473 consists in that no information is available to the user about a number of the propellant charges that remains in the box at a predetermined time period.
A propellant holder for fluid and/or gaseous fuel is formed as a pressure container. Such a pressure container, which serves as a propellant holder, are disclosed, e.g., in German Patent DE 197 46 018 C2.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,336,453 discloses an aerosol container with a device having a window in which a number of remaining, in the container, aerosol portions is shown with figures, color codes, or graphic markings. The drawback of the indicator of U.S. Pat. No. 6,336,453 consists in that the data are not visible when the container, e.g., is located in a receptacle of a dispenser. To ascertain as to the number of the remaining aerosol portions, the user has to retract the container from the receptacle, which means loss of time.
Accordingly, an object of the present invention is a propellant holder and a setting tool with the propellant holder in which the drawbacks of the prior art holders and setting tools are eliminated.
Another object of the present invention is to provide a propellant holder and a setting tool with which a number of remaining propellant charges can be easily ascertained.